It was a game that could not happen -- would not be allowed to happen -- in January. It was one that probably tells us absolutely nothing about either team's chances to win the Super Bowl, or even make a serious run at one. It was one that should have offensive coordinators all over the NFL drooling, even while it makes defensive coordinators get ulcers.

But it sure was fun to watch. If the NFL can serve up something close to that Broncos-Cowboys game once a week, even once every couple of weeks, nobody in America would complain. Defense may win championships, but 99 points (tied for the third-most ever) and 1,039 yards and nine touchdown passes win hearts, minds and souls.

Peyton Manning needs all his finger to count the points in this game. (AP Photo) (AP Photo)

Mix into the points and yards several scoops of drama, momentum swings, lead changes, excruciating human shortcomings and exhilarating redemptions -- not to mention a Hall of Famer and runaway MVP favorite playing second fiddle -- and you get "where-were-you-when-it-happened" games like Denver 51, Dallas 48.

It was tremendous theater, especially for an October weekend, especially since it wasn't expected any more than any other game involving the machine that is the Broncos' offense.

But what likely takes it to a level beyond for anyone who knows the two quarterbacks' full bios?

Knowing that this game was the very essence of who Peyton Manning and Tony Romo have been. Manning creates pyrotechnics like this during the regular season, but not nearly often enough in the playoffs. Romo creates them during the regular season, too, then makes a colossal blunder and winds up at home for the playoffs, or home too early from them.

That's why you can't talk about a game like this, in full, without talking about the defenses and about January. Manning and the Broncos have made defenses look bad so far in this unprecedented start, but they won't see sieves like this in the playoffs. Romo and the Cowboys couldn't be stopped for nearly the whole game, until they stopped themselves at the wrong time.

Still, it's only October, so why pick nits? The Broncos are still perfect at 5-0, and the 2-3 Cowboys are in first place. (Stop laughing. They are.)

Soak this up while recalling the madness of Sunday in Arlington: Manning threw four touchdown passes, raising his insane total through five games to 20. He ran one in himself on as flawless a fake as a slow-footed quarterback has ever executed . He totaled 414 yards in the air. His offense topped 50 points. He brought his team back from a 14-0 hole, plus two fourth-quarter deficits. His team halted a shocking upset that could have re-defined both teams' seasons.

* Romo. He had a career in one afternoon, for better and worse. No Cowboys quarterback - not Staubach, Meredith, White or Aikman - ever threw for more than the 506 he piled up. Only 11 players in NFL history ever topped that. He led the team back twice in the fourth quarter, too, from a deficit once and from a tie once. His 79-yarder to Dez Bryant that set up the go-ahead touchdown with seven minutes left was set to become an immortal moment in Cowboys lore.

Then he threw the kind of interception in the final minutes that makes Cowboys fans want to tie him up and force him to watch them set fire to his $108-million contract.

* Knowshon Moreno . When the Broncos drafted him in 2009 to be their next feature back, people imagined games of 150 total yards, clutch plays and big touchdowns. Going into this season, those same people wondered if or when he'd lose his job. On Sunday, Moreno gained 150 rushing and receiving yards and bulled in for the game-tying score with just over two minutes left.

* Danny Trevathan . The Denver linebacker put on a pair of goat horns on the opening Thursday night by prematurely celebrating a pick-six by dropping the ball before crossing the goal line. That's how everybody recognized his game Sunday ... when he picked off Romo, killed the Cowboys' big chance to win and essentially hand the game to Manning and the offense.

* Bryant. There is actually still time for him to fulfill the handful of predictions for him as MVP (Manning has a fairly prohibitive lead). The Cowboys pulling this off would have been a solid building block. Six catches, 141 yards, two touchdowns. And they weren't even the most yards by a Cowboys receiver - hello, Terrance Williams, the rookie who had 151 yards, a huge touchdown and an even bigger two-point conversion.

And Bryant's biggest play wasn't one of his touchdowns, it was the catch-and-run that the Cowboys turned into their last go-ahead score.

* The defenses. Traffic cones would have been just as effective. Manning makes it look easy, and has made a career of making teams look bad. Romo has done the same thing plenty of times. But the entire concept of getting the huge stop it needed to lock the game away, until Romo's interception, was laughable.

How comical? The game had 12 touchdowns, five field goals ... and one punt.

It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

Everybody needs to remember that at playoff time. Especially with Manning and Romo. If they both get there.